Romero Research Program: Scientific Workforce Diversity
As a Latina, Dr. Romero is particularly interested in assuring that science and medicine benefits the Latina community and other groups that science often leaves behind. Therefore, a large part of her work focuses on increasing diversity in the healthcare and scientific workforce.
Nationally, only 5% of physicians are African American and only 5.8% are Hispanic. As the Dean for Diversity and Inclusion for the last 5 years, Dr. Romero has led the University of Chicago Biological Sciences Division’s efforts focused on recruiting, retaining, and promoting more physicians and scientists of color. Her philosophy is that to truly move the needle on racial justice in medicine and science, we need to simultaneously move minorities to the center of research and build capacity to care for diverse patient populations by having a diverse healthcare and scientific workforce. Central to this is assuring that trainees, including underrepresented minorities, have access to mentors that demonstrate scientific rigor and foster environments that are safe, inclusive, and supportive of the trainee staying in science.
Based on the significant strides in diversity and inclusion that have been made at University of Chicago, Dr. Romero was invited to join the National Institutes of Health (NIH) - Advisory Committee to the Director’s Working Group on Diversity and was elected as the American Association of Medical Colleges (AAMC) Group on Diversity & Inclusion Central Region Representative.
- NIH. Racism in Science Report. NIH Advisory Committee to the Director Working Group on Diversity 2021. Role: Committee Member.